[¶1]
Enhanced Communications of Northern New England, Inc.,
appeals from an order of the Public Utilities Commission
granting in part and denying in part a petition for a
certificate of public convenience and necessity to operate as
a competitive local exchange carrier. See 35-A
M.R.S. §§ 2102, 2105 (2016). Enhanced contends that
the Commission's partial denial is unlawful and
unsupported by substantial evidence. We affirm the order.

I.
BACKGROUND

[¶2]
Enhanced is a Delaware corporation that sells communications
services, including long distance telephone and data
services, and is a wholly-owned direct subsidiary of
FairPoint Communications, Inc. FairPoint is an incumbent
local exchange carrier (ILEC). On June 23, 2015, Enhanced
filed a petition with the Commission pursuant to 35-A M.R.S.
§ 2102 to obtain a certificate of public convenience and
necessity to furnish telecommunications service as a
competitive local exchange carrier (CLEC).[1]Because an
application by a CLEC to operate in the same regional service
territory as an affiliated ILEC presented a novel issue, on
August 13, 2015, the Commission held an informal technical
conference to gather information about intended service plans
and the relationship between Enhanced and
FairPoint.[2] Several parties and stakeholders attended
the informal technical conference, including representatives
from FairPoint, the Office of the Public Advocate (OPA), Time
Warner Cable (TWC), and the CLEC Association of Northern New
England (CANNE). OPA, TWC, and CANNE all submitted comments
to the Commission regarding Enhanced's petition.

[¶3]
On March 21, 2016, the Commission staff recommended that the
Commission grant Enhanced's petition to the extent that
Enhanced would be allowed to operate as a CLEC in all Maine
exchanges except for those in which FairPoint, or an
affiliate or subsidiary, already provided service as an ILEC.
On June 20, 2016, the Commission issued an order largely
adopting the recommended decision, granting Enhanced's
petition in part, but denying it to the extent that Enhanced
sought to provide service as a CLEC in service areas where
FairPoint, or an affiliate or subsidiary, already provided
service as an ILEC.

[¶4]
The Commission found that Enhanced (1) satisfied the
definition of a local exchange carrier because it will
provide local exchange service in Maine, (2) possessed the
financial and technical capabilities to provide local
exchange service in the state, and (3) satisfied the
definition of a CLEC because it is not an ILEC. The
Commission noted, however, that whether the public
convenience and necessity required that Enhanced provide
service as a CLEC throughout Maine "present[ed] a
complicated question" because an entity wholly-owned by
an ILEC seeking to provide service in the same service
territory as that ILEC was a matter of first impression.

[¶5]
The Commission observed that if Enhanced provided service in
the same service territories as FairPoint, it was not clear
that a benefit would be realized in the form of increased
competition. The Commission articulated several concerns
raised by the parties, including that, because of its
corporate relationship with FairPoint, Enhanced could gain
favorable access and use of common facilities and resources,
customer data, pricing, prioritization of service calls, and
other competitive advantages over other CLECs. The Commission
found, according to Enhanced's representations at the
conference, that Enhanced's petition to obtain CLEC
authorization was not motivated by a desire to provide new or
additional service to customers- "Enhanced identified
only a single activity that its current lack of CLEC
authorization prohibits: the ability to requisition local
telephone numbering resources, " in particular
"thousand-number blocks of consecutive telephone
numbers."[3] The Commission acknowledged that
"[a]ccess to numbering resources by LECs is subject to
[Federal Communication Commission] rules and the guidelines
established by [the North American Numbering Plan
Administrator], which are designed to preserve limited
numbering resources, " but concluded, citing a
longstanding Commission policy to use number resources
efficiently to preserve the single 207 area code in Maine,
that it was not in the public convenience and necessity to
grant Enhanced's petition to operate throughout the
entire state. The Commission therefore partially denied the
petition insofar as Enhanced sought to operate in the same
territory as FairPoint, and emphasized that the partial
denial alleviated the competition concerns raised by parties
in the informal technical conference. The Commission
concluded by stating:

The Commission's partial dismissal of Enhanced's
petition is without prejudice to file, in a separate Docket,
another petition specifically requesting authority to operate
within the service territories of the FairPoint ILECs. Any
such petition should address the anti-competitive and
numbering concerns raised by the Commission and the parties
to this proceeding.

&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;[&para;6]
Enhanced filed a petition to reconsider the decision on July
11, 2016. The Commission did not act upon the petition and
thus it was denied by operation of law on August 1, 2016.
See 9 C.M.R. 65 407 110-12 § 11(D) (2013).
...

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